The richest people in America. List of billionaires by the magazine Forbes

As you know, America is a country of great opportunities for conducting or expanding various businesses. It goes without saying that you should have certain skills and human qualities that allow you to reach a sufficiently high material level. It's no secret that the vast majority of billionaires in the world are residents of the New World. In this article we will find out who are the richest people in America, what they own and how they came to their success.

The richest family

According to Forbes, the Walton dynasty is the richest in the United States. Her condition is estimated at just an unthinkable amount - $ 130 billion. The business was founded in 1962 by brothers James and Sam. Both have long gone to a different world, and today their offspring are developed by their heirs, of whom there are six people. Strictly speaking, the team's activities are based on total control of the world's largest retailer Wal-Mart.

Koch Industries

Charles Koch is another richest man in America. This entrepreneur and philanthropist was born on November 1, 1935 in Kansas, USA. He has a brother named David Koch, with whom they together inherited from their dad a very large business, based on the production of gasoline. Today, the corporation managed by Charles Koch, in addition to the chemical and petroleum industries, pays close attention to the production of various polymers, the implementation of many environmental programs and even cattle breeding. The business of the brothers is about 115 billion dollars, of which David Koch owns $ 42.9 billion.

Former Mayor of New York

Michael Bloomberg, born February 14, 1942 in Brighton, today is not just a successful entrepreneur, but also one of the richest people on our large planet. In the period from January 1, 2002 to December 31, 2013, he headed the mayor's office of New York. Like many of America's richest men, the businessman is a native of a Jewish family and has a prestigious education (graduated from the Harvard Business School). Michael Bloomberg owns one of the world's leading news agencies - Bloomberg. The empire of this outstanding American consists of a variety of television channels, radio stations and a worldwide computer network of financial news. At the heart of Michael's success lies his ability to think progressively and quickly. It was he who first came up with the connection of actual quotations of stock exchanges taking place in real time, with detailed analytics. Such a service allowed Bloomberg to become in some way a monopolist of the information field in the financial sector.

Occupying the post of mayor of New York, Michael determined his salary at a rate of one dollar a year and completely abandoned public housing, using only his income from business. As of 2016, the state of Bloomberg was about $ 40 billion.

Young billionaire

A relatively recent list of billionaires was replenished by a New York suburb Mark Zuckerberg. This outstanding polyglot and programmer was born in 1984 and already at the age of twelve he created his first ZuckNet program, which gave an opportunity to communicate on his local network to all his relatives and friends. After school, Mark was educated at an elite school Phillips Exeter Academy. The financial condition of Mark Zuckerberg has increased several fold after the development of a social network called Facebook. Initially, it was intended to expand the opportunities for communication between Harvard students, but the network began to expand rapidly, and at a certain stage the young American realized that it was urgent to invest big money in this promising project in all respects. So he dropped out of high school and put all his savings into his brainchild. After a while, Mark was able to attract wealthy investors, who contributed to the removal of the social network already at the international level. The state of Mark Zuckerberg in February 2016 was within 50 billion dollars. At the same time, the young man does not lead a tusovka way of life, does not expose his wealth for show, and lives happily with his wife, whom he has known since his student days, and brings up a small daughter named Max.

The Mars Dynasty

In 1911, Forrest Mars, Sr., was established confectionery company Mars. Nowadays, it is managed by the three heirs of the founder of the corporation. By the way, today the trademark produces not only one sweets, but also pet food such as Pedigree and Whiskas. The scale of production of the company inspire respect. Only one candy called M & M's in the US is produced daily about 400 million pieces. As for the state of the family, in 2016 it was about $ 78 billion.

The owner of the world's largest online store

American Jeff Bezos is another example of the ability to quickly navigate in trends and draw the right conclusions in the battle for success.

Jeff was born on January 12, 1964 in Albuquerque, USA. Having received an excellent education at Princeton University, the future billionaire started work at Fitel, which specialized in developing high-quality trading programs on the stock exchange. But already in 1994 Jeff got acquainted with the analytical forecast about the increase in sales through the Internet and understood in which direction he should work. Since 2000, the American has allocated some of his finances to a project called Blue Origin, which consists in launching spacecraft into near-earth orbit.

In 2013, the businessman bought out one of the most famous publishing houses - The Washington Post. On this acquisition Jeff spent $ 250 million.

Today Jeff Bezos is the founder and owner of the world's largest online store, known as Amazon. The billionaire adheres to the thesis that "the client is always right", and in relation to subordinates is characterized by exactingness, one might even say, pickiness. According to data at the beginning of 2017, Bezos has a fortune of 71.2 billion dollars.

Head of Oracle Corporation

Lawrence Ellison is an outstanding American entrepreneur who is well known for his charisma, impulsiveness and extravagance. At the same time, it should be noted that his significant contribution to the development of modern software.

The future billionaire was born in August 1944 in the Bronx. Experiencing his adolescence, Lawrence was extremely obstinate and independent, which is why he often argued with his adoptive father, who considered him an absolute loser and a complete, incompetent fool in life. After school, Larry became a student at the University of Illinois, who never graduated. After a while he again becomes a student, but already the University of Chicago, where he was expelled already in the first year of training.

But still the guy was destined to become successful. He had the ability to fully absorb new information and quickly became a programmer. And in 1970 he became the founder of Oracle, which exists to this day and brings billions of profits to its owner. Even then, America's richest people understood that there was a future for computer technology, and therefore Ellison had many competitors, such as SAP and Microsoft. This led to the fact that in 1990 the American company was on the verge of complete bankruptcy. However, he did not lose heart and took rather radical steps: he dismissed many of his managers, and he himself became the programmer, improving applications for managing databases.

At the same time, Larry was very demanding of his subordinates. In his corporation, all departments competed among themselves, rivalry between staff was encouraged, and the pace of work was such that the vice-president of the company took on the wife of the girl he met, because he clearly understood: he would have no time to look for another lady of the heart if he parted with this.

Confrontation with competitors

The main rival in the business world for Oracle is Microsoft Corporation. And their confrontation has reached even a personal level. So, for example, Larry flew on his plane over the house of Gates on a short flight and often criticized the opponent, accusing him of incompetence. Nevertheless, Ellison never managed to get around Gates in the ranking of the rich even after he won a lawsuit and got $ 5 billion for it.

The world's largest investor

Buffett Warren, whose fortune is estimated at 65.5 billion dollars in February 2017, is nicknamed the Seer for his ability to perfectly calculate various situations and material investments in advance.

The billionaire was born in Nebraska in 1930 and at the age of thirteen he formalized his first-ever tax return. The first serious financial achievement of the American was $ 10,000 and was made possible by the installation of slot machines in hairdressing salons. The basis of Warren's business is Berkshire Hathaway, which he acquired in 1965.

Education Buffett received in the walls of Columbia University under the leadership of Benjamin Graham. In his strategy, Warren adheres to the principle of long-term investment, that is, the ownership of an action of a company, in his opinion, should last at least 10 years. A businessman is known for his generosity towards charitable foundations. In the summer of 2010, he gave 50% of his finances to five such institutions. This act is still considered the most generous manifestation of charity on the planet in the entire history of the existence of our human race.

Buffett had rather serious health problems. In the spring of 2012, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, but the disease was identified at an early stage, and the billionaire from imminent death rescued the radiotherapy course on time.

The richest man in the world of 2015

Bill Gates (USA) from 1996 to 2007, and also in 2009 and 2015, was officially recognized as the richest man on earth. This man was born in 1955 and became famous not only for his wealth, but also for other billionaires to give half of their fortunes to charity.

Surprisingly, the future computer genius was expelled from the university just two years after he began his studies there. The main business partner of Gates is his friend Paul Allen, who in their tandem initially dealt exclusively with technical issues. Bill himself took over the negotiating processes, communication with customers and signing contracts. In 1976, the young Americans were created by all the now known company Microsoft, in which 64% of the shares belonged to Gates.

By the way, despite the reputation of a very adequate and calm person, for his life Bill was arrested three times for driving without documents and in a state of intoxication.

Some facts about the billionaire

To date, Gates has completely removed the authority of the head of the corporation, but at the same time is the largest holder of its shares. Also, the billionaire is rather modest in his daily life and very unobtrusively dressed. However, his dwelling is a high-tech building that impresses visitors with its technical highlights.

Gates loves books and reads them in the amount of 50 pieces per year. In his honor was also named the fly - Eristalis gatesi. In addition, the American owns the largest island of the Republic of Belize.

Forbes Rating

According to the respected print edition of Forbes, at the beginning of 2017 the list of billionaires. In it, the main American billionaires are ranked relative to each other in terms of their wealth. The list is as follows:

1. Bill Gates.
2. Warren Buffett.
3. Jeff Bezos.
4. Mark Zuckerberg.
5. Larry Ellison.
6. David Koch.
7. Koch Charles.
8. Michael Bloomberg.
9. Larry Page.
10. Jim Walton.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I would like to note that the richest people in America are not only well-educated, but also purposeful, mature, independent in all respects, who are not afraid at the right time to challenge both the society around them and themselves, A variety of fears and insecurities. Many of them are hereditary billionaires due to their ancestors, but the ability not only to save capital, but also to increase it makes us respect these businessmen and appreciate their business qualities.